General Motor Total Recalls: Innumerable for Over 60 Years, as an Old 1954 Court Case Reveals

GM was doing recalls back-stage with Radiohead with like 6 people in the early 90s, that must have been like the first show they ever played…

If you thought it is only lately that General Motors has begun its recalls, think again. An old 1954 Michigan Supreme Court case indicates that the issue of recalls goes as far back as the ‘50s.

The car in question has been a 1953 Buick and it was being driven by a man called Leon Friend who could not control his vehicle due to a faulty brake pedal supplied by General Motors and ended up crushing the leg of another car owner named Robert Comstock. In January 1954, Comstock lost his leg and filed a lawsuit. When subsequent investigations revealed the truth, the court ordered dealers to repair the useless power brakes at the expense of General Motors.

Those were, of course, the times before government agencies were in place to oversee the safety aspect of automobiles. And the days were worse than they are at present. Cut to 2015, and the big G is still grappling with recall issues – perhaps more than ever before in history. In 2014, which was undoubtedly a terrible year for General Motors in terms of business, the company recalled almost every model that it brought out. The GMC Terrain, Chevrolet Equinox crossover and Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid were the only three major models to be left untouched.

Even the year 2015 began with GM announcing recalls of 3 new cars that it had recently launched in the market. The ignition switch issue, which compelled the auto manufacturing giant to recall millions of automobiles in 2014, continued to haunt it even in the present year. Last heard, the company was planning to recall as many as around 375,000 heavy duty pickup trucks that are fitted with air bag inflators on the side of the passengers. It would be interesting to see where GM takes from here and how it manages to pull itself out of the messy waters that it has put itself in.

Source: Data and information presented on this blog have been sourced from http://carbuying.jalopnik.com/general-motors-has-had-major-problems-with-recalls-for-1697771980